While Apple's success with its mobile iOS platform is credited with invoking the proliferation of HTML5 video at the expense of Adobe's Flash, it's also causing a major shift in strategy for Microsoft's Silverlight.

At its Professional Developers Conference this week, Microsoft scaled back its plans for Silverlight, instead refocusing upon HTML5 as the platform for dynamic content on the web. It specifically cited Apple's iOS as a core reason for doing so.

The original Flash-killer

Like Flash, Silverlight was originally aimed at delivering a cross-platform method for delivering dynamic, interactive content and video, particularly (but not exclusively) on the web. Since that's what Flash was already doing, Microsoft targeted Flash for replacement with Silverlight.

Four years ago, Microsoft removed Flash from default installation on new PCs starting with Windows Vista, and lined up a series of partners who delivered videos exclusively in the new Silverlight format, initially using Microsoft's own WMA 9 video format.

Back in 2007, the threat of Microsoft using its monopoly position with Windows to crush Flash was great enough for California and several other states to seek a five year extension of the terms of Microsoft's antitrust settlement so as to prevent the company from using Windows to "tilt the playing field" in favor of Silverlight and against Flash.

While the tech media didn't report Microsoft's assault on Flash with nearly as much gusto as their provocative assault on Apple for backing web standards over either company's plugin, proprietary development platform, it was web standards (and Apple's support for them) that won out in the end.

Some fuss was made in 2007 over the fact that Apple's iPhone didn't run Flash, but nobody observed that the iPhone also failed to run Silverlight. In reality, neither Flash nor Silverlight were capable of running on a mobile device at the time; Adobe didn't ship a functional mobile beta of the full Flash until this year, and Microsoft has similarly just delivered its first mobile version of Silverlight in Windows Phone 7.

Over the last four years, sales of the iPhone, iPod touch and most recently the iPad have positioned Apple's iOS as the most attractive mobile platform to reach. According to NetApplications, iOS is the third largest platform (in terms of web use) behind Windows and the Mac, ahead of JavaME and Linux, and larger than Symbian, Android, BlackBerry, Windows Mobile, BREW, PlayStation and Wii combined.

Apple's mobile platform isn't "another platform to reach," it's the mobile platform to reach. This realization caused Adobe much grief earlier this year when it finally sank in that there was no straightforward way to get Flash-developed content to play on iOS devices like the iPad. Adobe has since rolled out demonstrations of tools designed to create HTML5 animations.

Desperately seeks standards

Microsoft has similarly backed down from its initial efforts to tie dynamic content to the proprietary Windows development tools within Silverlight. In 2008, Microsoft added support for H.264 video in addition to its own WMV 9, in large part due to the shift Apple had achieved in pushing widespread adoption of MPEG standards in iTunes and with the iPod.

With the continuing success of the iPhone and iPod touch, and particularly with launch of the iPad, Apple has done for HTML5 what it did with H.264 video and AAC audio before it: cultivated a huge demand for standards-based content on a popular device that's simply unable to play other, proprietary formats.

Microsoft earlier attempted to force adoption of its Windows Media Audio and Windows Media Video codecs in competition with the iPod, first with PlaysForSure and later with the Zune. However, its failure to even establish a beachhead in the war on Apple's iPod likely played a part in Microsoft's current decision to dial down the role of Silverlight and instead focus on HTML5 as the way to deliver dynamic web content.

Bob Muglia, president of Microsoft's Servers and Tools Division, told ZDNet's Mary-Jo Foley that, while Silverlight has some sweet spots in media and line-of-business applications, it's now seen primarily as the application platform for Windows Phone.

That positions Silverlight as being the "Cocoa Touch" of WP7, rather than a cross platform killer of Flash on the web.

Noting that "our [Silverlight] strategy has shifted," Muglia explained, "HTML is the only true cross platform solution for everything, including [Apples] iOS platform."

Microsoft's chief of engineering on Internet Explorer, Dean Hachamovitch, had earlier introduced the company's development conference, commenting in his keynote address, "HTML5 enables you to make engaging and interactive sites. With full hardware acceleration of the browser, HTML5 pages feel and run like an app or a game.

While Apple's success with its mobile iOS platform is credited with invoking the proliferation of HTML5 video at the expense of Adobe's Flash, it's also causing a major shift in strategy for Microsoft's Silverlight.

So while the "open" and standards loving Google continues to flout the proprietary, closed Flash as a differentiator for their Android platform, the "closed" and controlling, hates the open Web Apple is actually driving content providers towards standards based solutions-- and dragging the entire industry with them.

If Netflix switches to HTML 5 compliant delivery of their streaming video, it's all over.

They spoke of the sayings and doings of their commander, the grand duke, and told stories of his kindness and irascibility.

Adobe didn't ship a functional mobile beta of the full Flash until this year, and Microsoft has similarly just delivered its first mobile version of Silverlight in Windows Phone 7.

Pogue says WP7 doesn't run Silverlight.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pogue at NYT

Like the iPhone, the Web browser doesnt play Flash videos on the Web but it also wont play the HTML5 videos that the iPhone plays, or even videos in Microsofts own Silverlight format. So, no YouTube, no Hulu, no online news videos.

So while the "open" and standards loving Google continues to flout the proprietary, closed Flash as a differentiator for their Android platform, the "closed" and controlling, hates the open Web Apple is actually driving content providers towards standards based solutions-- and dragging the entire industry with them.

If Netflix switches to HTML 5 compliant delivery of their streaming video, it's all over.

Jobs did say that Adobe should concentrate on creating HTML5 authoring tools instead of criticizing Apple. I doubt Flash will ever die but I think Adobe can recycle it as an HTML5 tool and stay alive.

I would think so. I'm cautiously encouraged by these particular comments of Nack's:

Quote:

Adobe lives or dies by its ability to help customers solve real problems. That means putting pragmatism ahead of ideology.

Flash is great for a lot of things, and this week’s demos showed it’s only improving. It’s not the only game in town, however, and Adobe makes its money selling tools, not giving away players. Let’s help people target whatever media** they need, as efficiently as possible.

And they're using that to make a big deal of how Android handsets do the "full internet" are they? Google and the HTML 5 consortium like to show up together in public and talk about how they're best buddies? Android handsets are driving adoption of HTML compliance because they don't have proprietary Flash to fall back on?

They spoke of the sayings and doings of their commander, the grand duke, and told stories of his kindness and irascibility.

[1] Pogue is correct in that Windows Phone 7 doesn't support the Silverlight plugin in the web browser.
[2] However all third party applications are developed using Silverlight/XNA.

iPhone doesn't run Xcode IDE either. When comparing Adobe Flash finally delivering full Flash for mobile and in the same sentence saying MS delivered Silverlight with WP7, I fail to see the relevance if in fact WP7 does not play Silverlight content. I'm confused. Which is it? Yes or no? Does Silverlight content play in an app or what?

So while the "open" and standards loving Google continues to flout the proprietary, closed Flash as a differentiator for their Android platform, the "closed" and controlling, hates the open Web Apple is actually driving content providers towards standards based solutions-- and dragging the entire industry with them.

If Netflix switches to HTML 5 compliant delivery of their streaming video, it's all over.

They already serve up H.264 via Apple TV, iPad & iPhone so it won't be long. My guess is the DRM requirements will take a bit to sort out and you'll need an app for that.

iPhone doesn't run Xcode IDE either. When comparing Adobe Flash finally delivering full Flash for mobile and in the same sentence saying MS delivered Silverlight with WP7, I fail to see the relevance if in fact WP7 does not play Silverlight content. I'm confused. Which is it? Yes or no? Does Silverlight content play in an app or what?

1) All WP7 apps (at least 3rd party) are Silverlight apps.
2) Silverlight _content_ on a web page does not play inside the web browser on WP7.

So in other words, Silverlight is the native app technology on WP7, pretty much like Cocoa Touch is on iOS.

iPhone doesn't run Xcode IDE either. When comparing Adobe Flash finally delivering full Flash for mobile and in the same sentence saying MS delivered Silverlight with WP7, I fail to see the relevance if in fact WP7 does not play Silverlight content. I'm confused. Which is it? Yes or no? Does Silverlight content play in an app or what?

Yeah. Basically Adobe supports "special" flash on mobile devices and Microsoft supports "special" silverlight. They are both modified to run better on a mobile device. As a result they lost their ability to be cross platform. They can still be cross-phone. I'm surprised that Adobe isn't taking Microsofts strategy. It seems like they could try to get mobile phones to use Flash as the app platform. Maybe it just isn't fast enough. I think it is still an interpreted language. At least silverlight is just-in-time compiled.

And they're using that to make a big deal of how Android handsets do the "full internet" are they? Google and the HTML 5 consortium like to show up together in public and talk about how they're best buddies? Android handsets are driving adoption of HTML compliance because they don't have proprietary Flash to fall back on?

Don't start pulling this line now that AI has ran an article about it. To me, it's great that Android does Flash and HTML5, it doesn't put restriction to the user about what they can see. While it is true that Jobs wants HTML5 to be the standard, it is also true that up until April of this year (Source) the main reason people said there wasn't flash was because it was buggy, drained battery, etc... Please note that "pushing the standard" didn't come until after that article

PS: I don't have either an Android or iPhone because the iPhone isn't on verizon, but my wife does have a Droid X.

In any case, Silverlight seems actually to be in good shape as a line-of-business application framework on the desktop, where it has many nice features, and can be rolled out easily. But it's good of Microsoft to point out that it's not really there to do stuff you can do in HTML(5).

Don't start pulling this line now that AI has ran an article about it. To me, it's great that Android does Flash and HTML5, it doesn't put restriction to the user about what they can see. While it is true that Jobs wants HTML5 to be the standard, it is also true that up until April of this year (Source) the main reason people said there wasn't flash was because it was buggy, drained battery, etc... Please note that "pushing the standard" didn't come until after that article

PS: I don't have either an Android or iPhone because the iPhone isn't on verizon, but my wife does have a Droid X.

I am wondering with the AppStore changes if Apple will allow Flash in 3rd party browsers. I understand why they wouldn't want it in Safari and am happy it is not there. Freedom of choice is good, but if you can't elect not to have it that is worse. Especially since a lot of people hate it for the performance issues. ClickToFlash has been a life saver on my Mac.

It's interesting that when Microsoft wanted to kill Flash, they made their own competing plugin, but when Apple wanted to kill Flash they did it by backing standards.

In retrospect of course Apple's approach is more likely to succeed because it has the possibility of attracting allies (in this case Microsoft of all people) but Microsoft's approach would only have replaced one proprietary tech with another (theirs), so not much chance of gaining allies there!

Don't start pulling this line now that AI has ran an article about it. To me, it's great that Android does Flash and HTML5, it doesn't put restriction to the user about what they can see. While it is true that Jobs wants HTML5 to be the standard, it is also true that up until April of this year (Source) the main reason people said there wasn't flash was because it was buggy, drained battery, etc... Please note that "pushing the standard" didn't come until after that article

Oh yeah? Well then explain Apple’s presence with W3 to ratify HTML5 and their open source WebKit browser engine pushing HTML5 as far back as 2007 if they are only “pushing the standard” “after that article”?

PS: You keep saying Android does Flash and HTML5 but you are failing to note that the very limited scope of Android devices and number of units that can actually utilize Flash.

Dick Applebaum on whether the iPad is a personal computer: "BTW, I am posting this from my iPad pc while sitting on the throne... personal enough for you?"

So while the "open" and standards loving Google continues to flout the proprietary, closed Flash as a differentiator for their Android platform, the "closed" and controlling, hates the open Web Apple is actually driving content providers towards standards based solutions-- and dragging the entire industry with them.

As a Flash/Flex developer I think all of this is great news. Silverlight was always an also-ran. The Flash Authoring is becoming the design tool for the cloud, whether it's HTML5, Flash, mobile or all of the above. Flash Builder will become the IDE for transforming those pretty animations and video into an application that can be deployed to web, mobile, or desktop. pretty cool IMO.

Since its inception Silverlight added features that Flash later added to catch up. In those areas it was not an also ran. If you are referring to marketshare, well yeah, but based on its age I dont think anyone expected to have more than Flash after such a short timeframe.

Dick Applebaum on whether the iPad is a personal computer: "BTW, I am posting this from my iPad pc while sitting on the throne... personal enough for you?"

Oh yeah? Well then explain Apple’s presence with W3 to ratify HTML5 and their open source WebKit browser engine pushing HTML5 as far back as 2007 if they are only “pushing the standard” “after that article”?

PS: You keep saying Android does Flash and HTML5 but you are failing to note that the very limited scope of Android devices and number of units that can actually utilize Flash.

Take a stab at me without fully understanding huh?

Let me quote what I said so you don't think I'm BSing you.

Quote:

the main reason people said there wasn't flash was because it was buggy, drained battery, etc...

I do apologize for getting the date wrong, but my original thought still stands. People (aka common people, not SJ) kept saying flash was bad and all that stuff until the April release.

And what's so wrong about having a limited scope be able to? BTW, the same thing can be said about iPhones: "Only a limited scope of iPhones can actually do FaceTime." Again, I'm not saying it's a bad thing, but simply pointing out why it's a stupid argument.

Oh and also, it's the manufacturers and carriers who are pushing the "full experience" line, not Google.

I read that, as well as everything else you wrote in that post along with the comment you responded to. My comment stands, Apple was pushing the standard to become a standard before the original iPhone was released.

Quote:

I do apologize for getting the date wrong, but my original thought still stands. People (aka common people, not SJ) kept saying flash was bad and all that stuff until the April release.

Im not sure what April 2010 has to do with anything. The same arguments hold, the only difference is that it finally exists on Android for some handsets. It still makes page loading slower, there are still bugs that make page scrolling less than ideal, there are Flash sites that still dont work on a small touch-based display, it still drains the battery faster than not running the plug-in, and its still far less less ideal to playback H.264 video than the native video tag of HTML5 or even a native app due to the all reasons previous stated about Flash.

Quote:

And what's so wrong about having a limited scope be able to? BTW, the same thing can be said about iPhones: "Only a limited scope of iPhones can actually do FaceTime." Again, I'm not saying it's a bad thing, but simply pointing out why it's a stupid argument.

Oh and also, it's the manufacturers and carriers who are pushing the "full experience" line, not Google.

Youre not comparing like things, but that may be your plan to jack the thread into a different direction. Not gonna happen!

Flash was promised since 2007. It was said by Adobe that Flash was ready for the iPhone but that Apple didnt allow it. Did Apple also not allow Flash to get released to Android devices until mid 2010, and only a small subset of Android devices at that? What about Blackberry OS, or Windows Mobile or Windows Phone 7 or Symbian? Where is Flash for these devices? Where is Flash for all Android devices? Where are the stats that show Flash is better suited for streaming video (likely its single most common usage on the internet)?

Hey, its great that those very few devices can run Flash on their phones and have an option, but that doesnt excuse Adobe from dropping the ball and only picking it up long after they were going to lose the race. They got lazy, they got careless, and they lost out.

I wonder how much farther Flash would be behind if MS hadnt made Silverlight or if Apple hadnt made the iPhone which drew attention to how inept and lazy the Flash teams had become.

Dick Applebaum on whether the iPad is a personal computer: "BTW, I am posting this from my iPad pc while sitting on the throne... personal enough for you?"

I read that, as well as everything else you wrote in that post along with the comment you responded to. My comment stands, Apple was pushing the standard to become a standard before the original iPhone was released.

Im not sure what April 2010 has to do with anything. The same arguments hold, the only difference is that it finally exists on Android for some handsets. It still makes page loading slower, there are still bugs that make page scrolling less than ideal, there are Flash sites that still dont work on a small touch-based display, it still drains the battery faster than not running the plug-in, and its still far less less ideal to playback H.264 video than the native video tag of HTML5 or even a native app due to the all reasons previous stated about Flash.

Youre not comparing like things, but that may be your plan to jack the thread into a different direction. Not gonna happen!

Flash was promised since 2007. It was said by Adobe that Flash was ready for the iPhone but that Apple didnt allow it. Did Apple also not allow Flash to get released to Android devices until mid 2010, and only a small subset of Android devices at that? What about Blackberry OS, or Windows Mobile or Windows Phone 7 or Symbian? Where is Flash for these devices? Where is Flash for all Android devices? Where are the stats that show Flash is better suited for streaming video (likely its single most common usage on the internet)?

Hey, its great that those very few devices can run Flash on their phones and have an option, but that doesnt excuse Adobe from dropping the ball and only picking it up long after they were going to lose the race. They got lazy, they got careless, and they lost out.

I wonder how much farther Flash would be behind if MS hadnt made Silverlight or if Apple hadnt made the iPhone which drew attention to how inept and lazy the Flash teams had become.

We're just going in circles now so i'll just simply not argue back since we're arguing to completely different things.

I'm not comparing them. I was taking your same reasoning of "only a limited scope" and applied it to something else. Even you agree with me that it's a good thing that some devices can run Flash (I do not agree with "few" since any phone running 2.2 can run Flash).

Just so you can understand me better, I'm not arguing against flash or for html5 or for silverlight or whatever.

PS: My Windows Mobile phone from 3-4 years ago did flash (iirc it wasnt a solution from adobe though)

"With the continuing success of the iPhone and iPod touch, and particularly with launch of the iPad, Apple has done for HTML5 what it did with H.264 video and AAC audio before it: cultivated a huge demand for standards-based content on a popular device that's simply unable to play other, proprietary formats."

I do apologize for getting the date wrong, but my original thought still stands. People (aka common people, not SJ) kept saying flash was bad and all that stuff until the April release.

And what's so wrong about having a limited scope be able to? BTW, the same thing can be said about iPhones: "Only a limited scope of iPhones can actually do FaceTime." Again, I'm not saying it's a bad thing, but simply pointing out why it's a stupid argument.

Oh and also, it's the manufacturers and carriers who are pushing the "full experience" line, not Google.

"Main reason" and "people said" or total weasel phrases. One of the reasons some people had for not liking Flash on a mobile phone was power and performance issues.

Other people also pointed out that moving towards an open, standards based web was a good in its own right. I read quite a few articles, blog posts and board posts discussing Apple's own interest in achieving that end, in that it meant their initiatives would be less likely to have dependencies on proprietary, third party solutions that might be later deprecated. Apple has plenty of reason to want to avoid that path, as it has caused them problems in the past.

The idea that I, personally, am only now trotting out this argument because it got mentioned in an article is just insipid.

They spoke of the sayings and doings of their commander, the grand duke, and told stories of his kindness and irascibility.

I mean, myself, as an apple-fan-boy *no shame there, expected this to happen. When Apple wants to do something, they get it done! When Apple released their first ipod with flash storage, people were like.... wha? "how useless, it's so much more expensive... it's just useless! Compare that to hard drives!" But now look, virtually all things Apple sell *including the MacBook AIr have flash storage. And people love it!

When Steve Jobs released the first iPhone back in 2007, everyone thought it was a revolutionary product, and it was. With great graphical user interface, ease of use, and mobile web!
**When people figured out that the iPhone didn't have Adobe Flash, they were like, "eh. So who cares."

In 2008, the iPhone 3G was released. Still with no Adobe Flash. Apple specifically said they were in the HTML5 strategy. Steve jobs even wrote a public letter to Adobe stating its negatives.
**Now, people are like, "Wait a minute, after using the first iPhone, I realized, iPhone needs Flash! My website isn't running right!"

In 2009, the iPhone 3GS was released, and again, no flash. People now are like, "WE NEED FLASH! WE NEED FLASH!" for some random reason! Articles were posted how Apple's strategy of sticking with HTML5 will fail, it won't work, it'll just be silently gone.

But look now! It's the other way around! Adobe showed their HTML5 conversion tool, Microsoft Silverlight is basically unknown, Microsoft had to minimize their Silverlight project, and are now focusing on HTML5!

In 2010, iPhone 4 was released, and based on rumors, the iPhone 5 (or 4GS, which ever you want) will be released in 2011. People still are like, "WE NEED FLASH! WE NEED FLASH!"

But this article proves something: Apple's strategy is working. Other formats are being weakened as iOS devices become popular, the websites that are viewed should be supported also. Millions of iOS users browse the web. If your website uses Flash or Silverlight, most of them won't blame Apple. Most will blame Adobe or Microsoft. Most people understand the smooth, excellent quality of HTML5, it's like running its own app!

I believed in Apple for quite a long time. It's the truth, people. Apple is succeeding with the brining of HTML5 to our daily lives. So stop wining, just get on the road!

Since its inception Silverlight added features that Flash later added to catch up. In those areas it was not an also ran. If you are referring to marketshare, well yeah, but based on its age I dont think anyone expected to have more than Flash after such a short timeframe.

Yes I'm referring to market share. Every new technology has it's selling points, Silverlight was no exception. I'm happy Silverlight came along because it did put pressure on Adobe to compete... but at the same time happy it died because it was a weak attempt at replacing Flash. They should have just partnered with Adobe from the beginning... That would have been a killer plugin.

At its Professional Developers Conference this week, Microsoft scaled back its plans for Silverlight, instead refocusing upon HTML5 as the platform for dynamic content on the web. It specifically cited Apple's iOS as a core reason for doing so.

Did they really? The only reference I can find to the bolded assertion is in this article.

Quote:

With the continuing success of the iPhone and iPod touch, and particularly with launch of the iPad, Apple has done for HTML5 what it did with H.264 video and AAC audio before it: cultivated a huge demand for standards-based content on a popular device that's simply unable to play other, proprietary formats.

H.264 and AAC are also proprietary. I get the thrust of what you're saying but don't spin the line by mentioning these things as preferable to other, proprietary formats in the sentence. Because they all are. The ones you're advocating simply won mindshare.

In 2010, iPhone 4 was released, and based on rumors, the iPhone 5 (or 4GS, which ever you want) will be released in 2011. People still are like, "WE NEED FLASH! WE NEED FLASH!"

Just a thought: I wonder if, when Ford introduced the Model "T" people complained "But it doesn't come with a horse" or when Edison invented the light bulb: "But it doesn't come with a match"...
100 years ago people wold probably be right in saying "Our roads are made for horses, not motors - most hills are too steep for a motor" - but when new standards replace old ones, the infrastructure will change too. It just takes a bit of time.

This article and most of it's comments seem to take an opinion on what Silverlight used to be. Talk on video's and replacing flash is only really applicable to Silverlight 1. The fact that MS supports HTML5 and any of those standards in no way changes the future plans of silverlight or the direction it's heading. It would be like saying Apple say developers should support HTML5 and follow it with an article saying Apple to dial down iOS.

HTML5 is a web browser technology, Silverlight is a Windows, Mac, Linux desktop out of browser language, Windows Phone 7 language and also works inside a browser. You can see the future where the lightweight nature of Silverlight makes it a good fit for TV's, Cars etc. The same way as Adobe is trying to push Air on TV's, Phone's etc as well as computers.

Just a thought: I wonder if, when Ford introduced the Model "T" people complained "But it doesn't come with a horse" or when Edison invented the light bulb: "But it doesn't come with a match"...
100 years ago people wold probably be right in saying "Our roads are made for horses, not motors - most hills are too steep for a motor" - but when new standards replace old ones, the infrastructure will change too. It just takes a bit of time.

Thankfully they didn't just go out and shoot all the horses when the automobile became available. That is certainly the chant around here though. 'Kill Flash'. 'Death to Adobe'. That's all you hear. Maybe people should be calling for the end of the automobile era as you can't hardly walk around town without being nearly run over.